The most direct way to understand an ancient city is to read the words it wrote on stone with its own hand. Amaseia's great geographer Strabo described his homeland with his pen; but the city's soldiers, priests, officials, freedmen and grieving families also left a trace behind them: inscriptions cut into rock faces, altars, architectural blocks and gravestones. The epigraphic heritage of Amaseia spans some eight hundred years, from the Hellenistic age of the Pontic kings to the early centuries of Byzantium. These lines show, often with a clarity that the ancient authors could not provide, which language the city spoke, which names its people bore, to which gods they made offerings, which titles it boasted of under Roman rule and how it passed over to Christianity.

The Scholarly Discovery of the Amaseia Inscriptions

The ancient inscriptions of Amasya attracted the attention of European travellers and scholars very early. The text of a gravestone seen in the city's Armenian cemetery passed from the notes of the Habsburg diplomat Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq, who came as ambassador to the camp of Süleyman the Magnificent at Amasya in 1555, into the great collection of inscriptions published by Jan Gruter at the beginning of the 17th century. Gruter's collection also contains other inscriptions from Amasya, seen in the walls along the bank of the Yeşilırmak. Travellers passing through Amasya in the 19th century went on copying the stones: the English geologist William Hamilton recorded the inscriptions at the castle gate and in the town in the travel account he published in 1842, the French traveller Eugène Boré published the inscription of the Aynalı Mağara (Mirror Tomb) in 1840, and Andreas David Mordtmann presented new copies in 1861. The research journey of Georges Perrot and Edmond Guillaume through Galatia and Pontus brought the Amaseia inscriptions onto the agenda of French scholarship.

In the last quarter of the century local correspondents who lived in the city, or who were often there, came into play. Anthimos, the Greek Orthodox metropolitan of Amasya, copied a stele found in 1888, together with its measurements, and passed it on to scholars. Father Girard, a French priest in the city, sent Théodore Reinach copies of stones embedded in the walls of mosques, bridges and houses in the town; Reinach published them in a French journal in 1895. William Ramsay, too, published in 1883 a Latin military dedication that he had seen beside the ruined bridge over the Yeşilırmak. In this way a large part of the stones was recorded displaced from its original setting, reused as spolia in the buildings of the Ottoman town.

Studia Pontica and the 1910 Corpus

These scattered records were brought together by the Studia Pontica project, carried out at the beginning of the 20th century. The Scottish historian John George Clark Anderson laid the foundation of the first volume of the series with his journey through Galatia and Galatian Pontus in 1899. The Belgian historian of religion Franz Cumont and his brother Eugène Cumont travelled through the region in the spring of 1900 and described their archaeological journey of exploration in Pontus and Lesser Armenia in the second volume of the series. Franz Cumont was in and around Amasya in the last week of April 1900, and he personally read, measured and photographed most of the stones in the city. The young Belgian scholar Henri Grégoire went over the same stones again in 1907 and took paper squeezes (estampages) of some of them. The third volume, prepared jointly by the three scholars under the title Recueil des inscriptions grecques et latines du Pont et de l'Arménie, was printed in Brussels in 1910.

In this corpus the section devoted to Amaseia and its surroundings opens with a short history of the city and divides the inscriptions into three groups: those earlier than the annexation to Rome under Augustus, those of the imperial period, and those from the city's extensive rural territory. For each text the findspot, the dimensions, the height of the letters and the earlier publications are given with great care, the readings are discussed and the commentaries are written in French. Despite the century that has passed, this volume is still the basic work to which one turns first for the epigraphy of Amaseia. A considerable part of the inscriptions in the corpus can today also be read in online databases of Greek inscriptions.

Inscriptions of the Pontic Kingdom

Very few inscriptions survive from Hellenistic Amaseia, the birthplace of Strabo and the capital of the Pontic kings. While noting this scarcity, the editors drew attention to the fact that in the surviving texts Persian and native Anatolian names stand side by side with the Greek language. This shows that the native population had largely gone over to Greek in the Hellenistic age, while the noble tradition of Iranian origin also remained alive. Few as they are, the city's Hellenistic inscriptions are the oldest and most direct testimony in stone to the presence of the Pontic dynasty at Amaseia.

The most famous of them is the inscription cut directly into the rock just below the castle, close to the royal tombs, about two hundred metres above the river. Its letters are some forty centimetres high and were designed to be legible from the valley below. The inscription first reached the scholarly world in 1872 through a report passed to Ernest Renan by a traveller named D. Ermakow, and it was published by Perrot the following year. According to the text, the commander of the citadel (phrourarchos), Metrodoros, dedicated to the gods an altar and a flower garden around it on behalf of King Pharnaces. The letter forms show that the king in question is Pharnaces I, the grandfather of Mithridates Eupator, who reigned from about 190 to 170 BC. The inscription proves that this king kept a garrison in the castle of Amaseia; the Greek name of Metrodoros also suggests that the command of the garrison was given to officers of Greek origin.

The second major inscription of the same age is on the façade of the Aynalı Mağara, a rock tomb cut some distance from the royal tombs. In the first line, written in monumental letters, a personal name and the title "high priest" (archiereus) can be read. Earlier editors proposed a reading meaning "high priest of the Earth", but when Cumont and Grégoire examined the stone on site they corrected the name to the Anatolian Tes. The continuation of the inscription below the mouth of the tomb has been deliberately erased. Grégoire thought he could make out the name of Aphrodite in this damaged line, while Cumont, noting that the erasure had been carried out with care, in the manner of the erasure of the names of condemned emperors, cautiously suggested that the victorious Romans might have removed the name of Mithridates or Pharnaces here. Local tradition, on the other hand, attributes the erasure to a Turkish horseman enraged because his horse had shied at the gleam of the polished stone. The size of the tomb suggests a figure similar to the wealthy priests who, according to Strabo, governed the temple states of Comana and Zela.

Another stone from the Hellenistic period is a small limestone stele found at Amasya, copied in a market in Samsun and, thanks to Grégoire's efforts, taken to the Cinquantenaire Museum in Brussels. According to its inscription, his lord Meriones had this stele erected on the tomb of Pharnabazos, who had served him "with justice and devotion". The name Meriones is purely Greek, that of Pharnabazos Persian; the editors regard this juxtaposition as a typical example of the character of Pontic civilization, and of Amaseia in particular, which blended Hellenic and Iranian elements. The letter forms place the inscription no later than the reign of Mithridates Eupator (111–63 BC).

The City's Calendar and Its Titles in the Roman Period

One of the most concrete contributions of the inscriptions to the history of Amaseia is that they reveal the city's own calendar. At Amaseia years were counted from the year in which the city was attached to the Roman province of Galatia. The beginning of this era had earlier been placed in 7 BC or in AD 1; by comparison with the calendar of Sebastopolis, the authors of the 1910 corpus set its start between the autumn of 3 BC and 2 BC. On this reckoning the city's year 101 corresponds to AD 98/99, its year 169 to 166/167, and its year 379 to 376/377. Every inscription dated by the local calendar can thus be tied to a precise year. David French, who in later research collected the dated inscriptions, established that these records increase markedly from the 2nd century AD onward; together with the evidence of the necropoleis, this increase indicates that the city experienced its real growth in the Roman imperial period.

Inscriptions and coins also make it possible to follow Amaseia's position under Roman rule step by step. The city became the "metropolis", that is the chief city, of the district of Pontus Galaticus, and it did not give up this honorary title even when the administrative centre of the region later passed to its rival Neocaesarea (Niksar). In inscriptions of the imperial period the city's people are referred to as "the demos of the metropolis", and in a 3rd-century inscription Amaseia appears with the epithet "most splendid metropolis". On coins the title "first city of Pontus" was used from the reign of Antoninus Pius onward, and from the reign of Marcus Aurelius the title "neokoros", expressing devotion to the imperial cult. After Hadrian's probable visit to the city in AD 131, Amaseia also took the name "Hadrianeia", and in the Severan period new epithets derived from the emperors' names were added.

Information on the government of the city, however, is limited. In honorific inscriptions the people's assembly (demos) appears as the body conferring honours until the late 4th century; according to the editors this does not show that the assembly actually continued to meet and is largely a traditional formula. A rural inscription mentions the joint board of the city's archons, and another text records that a member of the city council named Aurelius Crispinus supervised the construction of a building. This last stone is a fragment of an entablature embedded in the wall of a house on the left bank of the Yeşilırmak, and it is one of the inscriptions whose text was already included in Gruter's collection at the beginning of the 17th century.

Buildings Dedicated to Emperors and Public Works

The most splendid Amaseia inscription of the imperial period survives on the scattered fragments of a white marble architrave. One of the fragments was used as the lintel of a gate in the castle, the others as spolia in the lintel and jambs of the door of an old madrasa on the road to Tokat. According to the reading completed by Cumont in 1900, the inscription is the dedication of a building to the emperor Marcus Aurelius, his son Commodus and "the people of the metropolis Amaseia". The text names Arrius Antoninus, governor of Cappadocia, because Pontus was attached to that province at the time. The fact that both emperors bear the title "Sarmaticus" and that Commodus is co-emperor dates the inscription to between AD 177 and 180. The dimensions of the architrave show that a monumental public building was erected in the city in these years.

A marble slab set upside down at the foot of the garden wall of the Yörgüç Paşa Mosque (Yorgi Paşa in older records), with the middle part of its surface flaked away, records the repair of an aqueduct. According to the legible part of the text, the ruined and collapsed aqueduct was renewed and presented as a display of generosity to "the people of the most splendid metropolis". On the basis of the phrase "consul for the third time, proconsul" among the donor's titles, Grégoire argued that this person was an emperor, most probably one of the Severan dynasty. The structure in question is very probably the celebrated aqueduct of Amaseia mentioned by earlier travellers, and it has been thought that some of the masonry repairs in its remains may date from this renewal.

A more modest honorific inscription is on a fragment of a red limestone base found in 1900 among stones piled in a street for the building of a house. According to the text, the people honoured Ammia, daughter of Sissios, for her virtue. Ammia is a common woman's name in Anatolia, while Sissios, according to Cumont, is very probably a name of Persian origin. This base, which shows that the city kept Iranian names alive in the Roman period as well, is small but valuable evidence of the mixed character of Amaseia's society.

The inscriptions also fill in the traces of the city's public works where the sources are silent. From the texts collected by the editors and from the accounts of hagiographers it emerges that in the imperial period Amaseia built or renewed temples, a theatre, a stadium and an aqueduct. The mention, in the martyrdom account of Saint Basiliscus, of the theatre in the city, of a place called "Petason" and of the temple of Serapis right beside it, are rare details which, together with the inscriptions, help one picture the public spaces of the ancient city.

Traces of the Roman Army at Amaseia

Amaseia lay at the junction of military roads running from inner Anatolia to the Euphrates frontier, and this position is reflected in the inscriptions. A Latin altar inscription copied by Ramsay in 1883 beside the ruined bridge over the Yeşilırmak was dedicated to Jupiter Optimus Maximus by the cavalry unit Ala I Flavia Augusta Britannica. This thousand-strong unit of Roman citizens boasts of having twice received collective decorations for its valour. The unit was normally stationed in Lower Pannonia and appears in a military document of AD 114 as sent on campaign. Cumont thought that the unit had distinguished itself during this campaign, that is, Trajan's Parthian war, and that its commander had the dedication set up at Amaseia on the way back.

Another Latin inscription, reported to have been seen in the rocks of the castle above the great tombs, bears the name of a cavalry officer named Lucius Sempronius Macedo from the city of Altinum in Italy. Macedo held the rank of decurio in the Ala Claudia Nova; this unit was in Lower Moesia in 105, and the inscription shows that he too took part in a war in the East, most probably again Trajan's Parthian campaign. On a Greek stone set just below the cornice of the Bayezid Paşa Mosque, which Cumont was able to read only with binoculars, freedmen of a primipilaris named Lucius Cornelius Casperianus, that is one of the senior centurions of a legion, are mentioned. A similar inscription near the ruined bridge names a Cornelius Priscus, honoured with a gold-ornamented saddlecloth and a purple garment; Cumont wrote that he knew of no other example of such a decoration awarded to a cavalryman.

A document on the military presence added in recent years is a Latin funerary stele acquired by the Amasya Museum in 2012 and registered under inventory number A.2012.7. According to the summary of a publication whose full text could not be consulted, the stele belongs to Gaius Iulius Neo, a soldier of the legion V Macedonica, and is dated to the 2nd century AD because of the ivy leaves used as punctuation marks. The stone has been added to a small group of gravestones documenting the presence of soldiers of this legion at Amaseia and has been assessed as evidence supporting the view that soldiers were recruited from the local population. The Hellenistic and Roman inscriptions, milestones and reused blocks displayed in the museum garden show that finds of this kind are still increasing.

Gods and Cults

The inscriptions also shed light on the many-layered religious life of Amaseia. The chief god of the city was Zeus Stratios, the protector of the Pontic dynasty. Three inscriptions dedicated to this god come from the sanctuary on the mountaintop near Ebimi (today Yassıçal), about ten kilometres east of the city: a small altar dedicated by a man named Basileus, a balustrade set up in year 101 of the city calendar (AD 98/99) during the term of the city's board of archons, with the temple's neokoros also named, and the base of an offering made from the temple revenues by the life priest Gnaeus Claudius Philon. The history of the sanctuary, the royal sacrifices and the debates over its interpretation are treated in detail in the article devoted to Zeus Stratios.

An hour's distance from the city, at a place called "Allyghin", the doorway of a cave from which a stream gushes out bears an inscription dedicated to the Nymphs. According to the text on the lintel, Lucius Iulius Cornelianus Celer made the doorway for "the great goddesses, the Nymphs". The lines added later on the jambs, in thinner letters, warn the visitor to "approach this place in purity". Cumont thought that the reverence for the Nymphs in Pontus was the continuation of a much older belief in sacred waters in the region. On a slab found in the village of Marenja near Merzifon, a man named Lucius Iulius Severus states that, in fulfilment of his vow, he founded a sacred place for Artemis, Apollo and Leto as "benefactor gods"; the fact that Artemis is written first in this triad suggests that she was identified with the great native goddess.

There are also traces of cults of foreign origin. A stele found in 1888, bearing a wheel motif at the top, was set up by a woman named Tryphaina for a "pious soldier" named Titus Aurelius Lucanus. Since the military unit to which Lucanus belonged is not mentioned, Cumont suggested that he may have been an initiate who had attained the grade of "soldier", the third of the seven grades of the mysteries of Mithras. Coins and written sources show that the Egyptian Serapis also had a temple in the city, and that Aphrodite, Ares, Tyche, Hermes, Dionysus, Athena, Asclepius and the deified river Iris were depicted on coins. According to a legend, the founder of the city was the god Hermes.

One inscription that must be mentioned here is a short dedication cut into the bedrock in the castle, near the rock-cut stepped tunnel. The text reads "Kyrinas, for his son Eupator, the steps, as a vow". In some studies this inscription has been cited as evidence that the steps or the tunnel were built by Mithridates VI Eupator. In the epigraphic collections in which the inscription was published, however, the text is dated to the 1st–2nd century AD, and Eupator appears here as the name of the son of Kyrinas, who made the dedication. The survival of the royal name among ordinary people is an interesting detail showing that the memory of the Pontic dynasty lived on in the city's stock of names in the Roman period.

Daily Life and Social Structure

Gravestones make up the largest group of Amaseia's inscriptions. Their relation to funerary architecture and to the necropoleis is discussed in the article devoted to the necropoleis of Amaseia; here only a few examples that shed light on the city's social structure will be mentioned. A limestone slab set about three metres high in the façade of the Tomb of Kılıçarslan is the epitaph of a gladiator named Pinnas, a net-fighter who fought five times and was never caught. The words at the end of the text, "I was not, I knew not, I came to be, I know not, I am not, I care not", reflect, according to Cumont, a view of death popularized by Epicurean thought and adopted in the gladiatorial schools. Another stele tells how a beast-fighter named Troilos, after defeating all the bears in the stadium, was overcome by fevers. These two stones show that the people of Amaseia were fond of gladiatorial combats and animal fights, and that the shows were most probably held in the stadium.

A stele found embedded in the paving of a basin in the courtyard of the Greek church of Saint George states that Aurelius Philoromos, commemorated by his wife, was an "archiatros". This title designates the official physicians who served on behalf of the city. A three-part verse inscription at the entrance of a rock tomb below the castle tells how a father named Rufus brought home the bones of his son Kleombrotos, who had distinguished himself in legal learning and died young, just after taking up office as judicial assessor to the governor of Bithynia, and laid them beside his ancestors. A short inscription cut into a conical rock on the left of the road leading to the Aynalı Mağara names a woman called Pythodoris; Cumont thought that this name had been given in memory of the famous Pontic queen Pythodoris, a contemporary of Strabo.

The people of Amaseia also left traces beyond the borders of their city. At Athens one inscription names Titus Varius Sabinus, whose "homeland is the famous city of Amaseia", and another four people described as Amaseians, while at Rhodes an Amaseian named Aristokrates son of Antipatros is recorded. The most remarkable document on the city's notables is a limestone block embedded, near the Tersakan bridge, in the wall that carries the road to the Aynalı Mağara. Erected by the people of the metropolis in year 379 of the city calendar, that is AD 376/377, for a woman whose name is lost in the broken part, this monument states that she was the niece of two distinguished persons of senatorial rank, a relative of Marius and Arinthea of consular descent, and the daughter of Primos the Younger, "favourite of the kings", and of Aglaia of senatorial rank. Cumont identified Arinthea as the sister of Flavius Arinthaeus, the famous general of Julian, Jovian and Valens. The inscription is a rare source showing the ties that 4th-century Amaseia had with the imperial aristocracy.

Christianity as Reflected in the Inscriptions

The church of Amaseia is very old; according to tradition the Apostle Peter passed through the city, and in the middle of the 3rd century Phaidimos, bishop of Amaseia, consecrated Gregory Thaumaturgus as bishop of Neocaesarea. Bishop Basileus was martyred in the persecution under Licinius, and his successor Eutychius attended the Council of Nicaea in 325. The editors drew attention to the fact that, despite this deep-rooted community, the Christian inscriptions found in the city are of a relatively late date. This may be explained by the more intensive destruction and reuse of Christian monuments in later centuries, or by the early Christians' avoidance of conspicuous symbols.

The most important of the Christian inscriptions is a two-metre-long slab of brown limestone set beside the main entrance of the Yörgüç Paşa Mosque. According to the verse text, Saint Theodore, "the athlete of Christ and citizen of the heavens", as protector of this city persuaded the "pious and victory-bringing" emperor Anastasius to build "a throne of the holy mysteries" in his name, that is, a church. The church was obtained by Mamas, "the most pure initiate"; Cumont interprets this as meaning that Mamas was bishop of Amaseia. Down to 1910 the name of Mamas did not appear in the known lists of bishops. The emperor in question is Anastasius I (491–518). According to legend, the soldier Theodore (Theodore Tiro) was martyred at Amaseia in 306 for burning a pagan temple, and in the Middle Ages the column to which he had been tied was still being shown. According to Grégoire's detailed analysis, the inscription is written in a metre based on stress rather than on long and short syllables, resembling the verses of the Latin poet Commodian, and it is the only example known for Greek up to that time.

Another verse slab, its upper part broken, embedded in the wall at the foot of the minaret of the Fethiye Mosque, relates that ever since springs were brought to "the temple of the divine king", the holy see has rejoiced in the flowers of its garden, adorned with garlands of ivy. Grégoire interpreted these lines as the last two couplets of a poem belonging to a cathedral surrounded by a garden watered by springs, and on the basis of the letter forms he placed it at a very late date. On a small marble slab embedded in the Tersakan bridge a single line can be read meaning "Light, all things are light, and God remains in the midst"; the Byzantines are known to have been fond of such prayerful inscriptions resembling riddles.

Everyday objects also carry Christian writing. On the body of a small vessel of reddish terracotta in the collection of Ahmed Efendi Merekli-zade of Amasya, the wish "Kind-hearted Capitolina, drink and may you live" is incised; Grégoire dates it most probably to the 4th century. On a heavy marble basin found in a garden at the foot of the castle there is a short Byzantine inscription addressing a certain Constantine as "lord". The most extraordinary document, however, is a short inscription in a cartouche at the top of a large stele. The inscription marks the burial place of a woman named Maria, described as an "ascetic" and a "stylite". Cumont does not find it surprising that Pontus, the cradle of monasticism in Anatolia, produced women ascetics, but he regards the retreat of one of them to the top of a column as a remarkable exception; the word meaning "female stylite" first became known through this stone.

Inscriptions from the Territory of Amaseia

Strabo describes the wide lands of his homeland in detail: the narrow valley that begins at the foot of the citadel widens to form the plain of Chiliokomon (Suluova), after which the districts of Diakopene and Pimolisene extend as far as the Halys (Kızılırmak). On the basis of a note by Pliny, the authors of Studia Pontica gave the name Gazakene to the region surrounding the city and published under this heading the inscriptions collected in the Yeşilırmak valley and the surrounding mountains. Since some of these rural inscriptions are dated by the city calendar, they have also been used to determine the boundaries of the territory of Amaseia. Some of the inscriptions found in Merzifon had been brought from elsewhere; with this evidence the editors also argued that Merzifon was not founded on the site of an ancient city and that Suluova belonged to the territory of Amaseia.

At Kale Köy, two hours south-east of Amasya, a fragment was found among the stones of a ruined wall which, according to Grégoire's reading, bears a word connected with the name of the district of Diakopene; the district name mentioned by Strabo has thus very probably been confirmed in stone as well. A fragment embedded in a fountain on the road to Erbaa, on the right bank of the Yeşilırmak, names Gaius Fabius Diadumenos, who was charged with carrying out the last wishes of someone who died in year 178 of the city calendar (AD 175/176). On a summer pasture between Mount Lokman and the village of Ebimi, a moss-covered stele in an old Turkish cemetery was set up by a father named Agrikolas for his son, who died at the age of seven in year 238 (AD 235/236). The word in the text meaning "shaking" shows, according to Cumont, that the child died in an earthquake or in a fit of convulsions. Downstream from Amasya, on a rock behind the mill of a large village recorded as Ziarel on the left bank of the Yeşilırmak, are written the words "the place of John, the servant of God".

Ongoing Research in Museums and in the Field

The epigraphy of Amaseia has continued to develop since the 1910 corpus. George E. Bean published an article on the inscriptions of Pontus in Belleten in 1953; David French collected the city's dated inscriptions in a separate study in 1991 and re-examined the sanctuary of Zeus Stratios. New texts such as the dedication of Kyrinas on the castle steps have been published in international epigraphic journals and added to the collections of inscriptions. The rescue excavations carried out by the Amasya Museum in the castle and in the town in the 2000s have brought to light new grave stelae and architectural blocks.

The Amasya Museum is today the most important guardian of this heritage. In the garden west of the museum Hellenistic and Roman inscriptions, milestones, sarcophagi and Byzantine stelae are on display; inside, the building inscriptions of Seljuk and Ottoman monuments share the same space with the ancient inscriptions. Some of the stones recorded in the 1910 corpus still stand in the walls of the city's mosques, tombs and bridges, where they were reused as spolia; the whereabouts of others, it appears, are no longer known today. Every building project and excavation in the city carries the possibility of a new stone coming to light. Beside the monumental rock-cut tombs of the kings, the inscriptions of Amaseia make room, in their own words, for the city's soldiers, priests, physicians, gladiators and ascetics.

Chronology

c. 190–170 BC: Reign of Pharnaces I; the citadel commander Metrodoros has the rock-cut dedication carved at the castle on the king's behalf.

111–63 BC: Reign of Mithridates Eupator; the stele erected by Meriones for Pharnabazos dates no later than this period.

3/2 BC: Amaseia is attached to the Roman province of Galatia; the city's local calendar begins in this year.

AD 98/99: A balustrade is dedicated at the sanctuary of Zeus Stratios in year 101 of the city calendar.

After AD 114: Latin inscriptions at Amaseia of cavalry units that took part in Trajan's Parthian campaign.

AD 177–180: Monumental architrave inscription dedicated to Marcus Aurelius and Commodus.

AD 376/377: The people of the metropolis erect a monument for a woman connected with the imperial aristocracy.

491–518: Construction of the church of Saint Theodore under Anastasius I; the verse inscription of Mamas.

1555: Busbecq is at Amasya; the inscriptions in his notes later pass into Gruter's collection.

1842: William Hamilton publishes the Amasya inscriptions in his travel account.

1872–1873: The Pharnaces inscription at the castle reaches the scholarly world and is published by Perrot.

1895: Father Girard's copies are published by Théodore Reinach.

1900: Franz Cumont examines the inscriptions of Amasya in the last week of April.

1907: Henri Grégoire rereads the stones and takes copies of them.

1910: The Studia Pontica III corpus by Anderson, Cumont and Grégoire is printed in Brussels.

1991: David French publishes his study of the dated inscriptions of Amaseia.

2012: The Latin gravestone of Gaius Iulius Neo, a soldier of the legion V Macedonica, enters the Amasya Museum.

Bibliography

Primary sources

  • J. G. C. Anderson, F. Cumont, H. Grégoire, Studia Pontica III: Recueil des inscriptions grecques et latines du Pont et de l'Arménie, Fasc. I, Brussels, 1910 (section on Amasia and the territory of Amasia, nos. 94–146a).
  • Strabo, Geographika, XII, 3, 39.
  • "A New Latin Inscription at the Museum of Amasya in Northeastern Turkey" (gravestone of Gaius Iulius Neo, Amasya Museum inv. A.2012.7).
  • Kamil Doğancı, Recep Altın, "Strabon'a Göre Antikçağda Amaseia ve Çevresi", Karadeniz Araştırmaları, XV/58, 2018.

Academic studies

  • G. E. Bean, "Pontus Yazıtları", Belleten, 17, 1953.
  • D. H. French, "Dated Inscriptions at Amasia", Arkeoloji Dergisi, Special Issue 1 (Erol Atalay Memorial), 1991, 65–70.
  • Hüseyin Onur Erdem, "Nekropoller Işığında Amaseia Antik Kenti ve Yayılım Alanı", Arkeoloji Dergisi, XXXIII, 2024.

Books

  • F. Cumont, E. Cumont, Studia Pontica II: Voyage d'exploration archéologique dans le Pont et la Petite Arménie, Brussels, 1906.
  • SEG 40:1160 (the step dedication of Kyrinas), Epigraphica Anatolica 15, 1990, 136.

Other sources

  • General descriptive records on the collection and garden display of the Amasya Museum.

Online sources